


fingers tap into what you were once

by princegrantaire



Category: Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Kiss, Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:31:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25490173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princegrantaire/pseuds/princegrantaire
Summary: With Ali around, it’s hard to believe there’s anything as dreadful and unpleasantly definitive as the war to dwell on, harder still to believe barely a year has passed since he’d been left to aimlessly pretend it’d been all worth it.Thisis worth more than he can give, the spilled blood -- not so much.
Relationships: Ali ibn el Kharish/T. E. Lawrence
Comments: 7
Kudos: 33





	fingers tap into what you were once

**Author's Note:**

> HI I CONTINUE TO REMAIN HORRIBLY DERANGED DUE TO LOA REASONS AND WILL PRESUMABLY KEEP BEING LIKE THIS FOR THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE. IT'S VERY UNFORTUNATE.
> 
> this is mostly (and obviously) based around the movie but elements of lawrence's real life (clouds hill, sassoon, etc) have spilled into it for flavour. locations are very much real etc etc. lawrence is -- regrettably -- peter o'toole's actual height for clothes sharing purposes.
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> PS: THANK YOU @SLAAPKAT YOU KEEP ME GOING THRU LITERALLY EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD ILY

Ali glows in the early morning light, far from sand and heat and suffocating sun. Down to his shirtsleeves -- and Lawrence had insisted it’s perfectly proper -- and clad in his borrowed trousers, here among the green of the woodlands bordering Clouds Hill and still a little ways away from Bovington Camp, he’s positively radiant. Lawrence, though he knows himself prone to poetics on occasion, says it as nothing short of a fact.

He’d be content to watch for the rest of eternity, just sit in the grass and observe the minute movements of the man he’s been so taken with for longer than he’d ever thought possible. Lawrence has written much about the unintentional elegance of men, his fascination with repose and action alike but there’s very little that could possibly capture the reality of Ali.

“Aurens, do you truly not have any deserts here?” Ali asks, coming to sit by his side, no less enchanting in proximity.

Lawrence thinks on that.

With Ali around, it’s hard to believe there’s anything as dreadful and unpleasantly definitive as the war to dwell on, harder still to believe barely a year has passed since he’d been left to aimlessly pretend it’d been all worth it.

_This_ is worth more than he can give, the spilled blood -- not so much.

He smiles.

“We have sand dunes,” Lawrence concludes, indulgent, “I can take you to the beach one of these days. It’s not too far.”

Ali hums, quite clearly pleased with the answer, and Lawrence cannot believe he’d ever settled for letters. It’ll be an exercise in the impossible to be content now, he thinks, when he’s relearned the pleasure of Ali’s company without their very existence hanging by a thread. Mostly, Lawrence seeks to prolong the moment and his own rare contentment. It doesn’t strike him as too selfish a desire.

There’s nothing like time here and any contemplations of the future, what might become of the two of them after a visit that’s unbelievable in itself, stings very little and certainly only briefly. Lawrence does think of Siegfried and his fellows, the great conversationalists and bright young things. Ali is much more but Lawrence refuses to be cheated out of the comfort of companionable silence, doesn’t let the chirping of distant birds and ruffling of leaves go wasted on him when a mere existence together is all he’s wanted. Wide-eyed wonder aside, Ali must be much on the same page.

And then again, he’s always wide-eyed and beautiful.

Every stolen moment in the desert remains close to Lawrence’s heart but he cherishes this hollow they’ve found in the woods and the opportunity to lean against Ali and feel the solid weight of him, too. He’s warm, even here.

After Arabia, spring in Dorset strikes Lawrence as very nearly cold. It isn’t, of course, but he fears he might forever find himself caught somewhere in-between.

Perhaps it’s become obvious.

“It’s very lonely here,” Ali says but it’s clear he doesn’t mean anything by it. To him, the vast loneliness in a horizon of sand is a given and Lawrence can’t imagine this enclosed isolation to be especially strange.

If one wishes to engage in the practice, it’s not all that difficult to hear glimpses of the trains passing by, hurrying from London to the miniscule railway station in Moreton and beyond. The nearby garrison offers its own signs of life. Deserted, yes, but not empty, surely not all-consuming like the Nefud. Lawrence hasn’t forgotten, he doesn’t think he can.

He turns slightly to look at Ali, delighted at the way the light spills over him.

_I meant it to be that way_ is what Lawrence doesn’t say, no matter how close it resides to the truth. Instead, he settles on: “Not anymore.” Spoken with a smile, it _is_ perfectly true. Unlike Ali, the thought of loneliness hadn’t crossed his mind until now.

Lawrence wants to reach out in some way but the distance, of which there is very little, appears unbreachable. A no man’s land of indecision. There’s hardly any risk out here and yet something stills his hand. Last night, rightfully exhausted from the trip, Ali had only had time to look vaguely perturbed by the sleeping situation -- the visitors’ sleeping bag thoughtfully labelled _tuum_ laid across the divan in the book room -- before seemingly accepting his fate and succumbing to sleep in a matter of minutes. Ever the gracious host, Lawrence had retained his own place downstairs, snug in the _meum_ sleeping bag, realising quite belatedly that Ali might have preferred his presence.

Then, after the meager breakfast Lawrence had been able to scrounge together, they’d found themselves here, still nothing more than old friends.

And Lawrence thinks he should want more. He _does_. An inland taking of Akaba had seemed easier to navigate. It’s Ali that’s taught him love outside his books and poems. In the long months since his departure, it’d occurred to him as almost odd that there would be no one to remind him of his own body’s limits.

Ali had understood him to be an ordinary man and had loved him all the same. No longer blinded by the barbarity of hope and a victory he’d deluded himself into believing to be noble, Lawrence knows he’s taken a lot for granted.

He intends to rectify his mistake.

“Did you think it’d be all like London?” Lawrence asks, eventually. He thinks back to the children’s book he’d picked up on a whim and Ali’s sheepish interest.

It had flung around grand words like _citizens_ and _parliament_ and everything he’d tried to give Ali’s people, the miraculous freedom he’d hoped to accomplish. He’s not sure what they _had_ accomplished, if anything at all, in the end.

“No.” Ali shakes his head, perfectly serious. It’s an urge Lawrence knows well but there are no wars missteps might cost them here and no generals to impress. “Feisal has told me much about the English countryside. From his discussions with Allenby, I think. It’s greener than I expected.”

A year ago, Lawrence would’ve said just about the same thing. It's easy to forget about any trace of green, out there in the midst of the blinding sands.

\---

They decide on a late lunch in Moreton, incurring only the minimal amount of odd glances thrown their way. It’s not a particularly sizable village and Wareham Town, Lawrence has tried explaining on the walk here, would have extended a wider range of options but Ali had seemed both disinterested in the intricacies of the matter despite being presented with maps and immensely wary of Lawrence’s know-how around a motorcycle.

It’s no great loss and Lawrence finds his own entertainment, still nearly giddy with exhilaration, in the clothes Ali’s deemed necessary to borrow from him. He’s kept his own boots -- especially convenient for trudging along the trail -- but certainly not a modicum of this morning’s awe has evaporated. Ali must have felt the same way when he’d handed him his robes. Wedding robes, as Lawrence would later find out, clued in by amused whispers from Daud and Farraj. He’s kept them, of course. Washed and folded, carefully placed in a drawer and never again touched. Lawrence remembers Ali’s smile, often lingers on it during long, too-dark nights. Now, he’ll even remember the very same pleasure blossoming in his chest.

And, nevertheless, there is rarely sufficient protection to be orchestrated against a prevailing sensation of otherness. It is found here, a quaint little tea-room in the middle of nowhere, and most assuredly elsewhere, too.

\---

Lawrence has no recommendations, partially because he’s only in the habit of eating out when accusations of being some sort of _eremite_ start being hurled his way from interested parties. More acutely, he’s made it his business to be preoccupied with Ali’s comfort -- presently hard to gauge, he’d never occur to Lawrence as out of place.

Consequently, Ali braves his lunch with as much gusto as Lawrence had reserved for mutton fat all those months ago. He doesn’t fight a fond smile, hovering on the edge of mirth, at Ali’s pinched expression.

There is a certain degree of incompatibility readily accepted, even relished.

“They’ve got good tea, at least,” Lawrence says, merely to tease.

Ali looks nearly hopeful.

\---

“Do you always get so many stares?” Ali asks and Lawrence falters in the brisk breeze.

They’re walking side-by-side, the urge to reach out flares up like an old wound. He wouldn’t hold Ali’s hand, he thinks, not even as the day winds down and the dark is deepened by the woods but the thought momentarily distracts from that damning question. Courage has abruptly deserted him. Ali must--

He must know _Lawrence_ hadn’t been the intended recipient.

“My reputation precedes me,” he says.

Is that being kind?

Ali, well-versed in the art, doesn’t look much beyond bemused. “Yes. It would be the same at home, I’m sure,” is what he settles on, willing to let it pass, perhaps still merely entranced by the novelty of England. Lawrence knows he doesn’t deserve him.

“I’m sorry,” he manages, barely above a whisper.

For the lie, yes.

And for everything that’s come before it. Lawrence trusts Ali to understand, breathes easy at the hand on his shoulder -- there and gone in the blink of an eye. It’s enough.

\---

Clouds Hill has gone cold in their absence. Up in the music room, as Ali curls up on the couch and Lawrence busies himself with the fireplace, he lets his thoughts drift towards the weeks ahead.

This first day --

And surely Lawrence can’t count the previous one that had constituted of trains upon trains and not much else, the two of them steadily verging on combat fatigue by the end of it.

\-- has made him realise just how easy it had been to fall back into old routines. Ali is _here_ , the world has changed. No, not changed, not exactly. Rearranged, then. The guilt hasn’t quite evaporated but the burden is easier to carry and Lawrence can’t reconcile the comfort of it with the newfound need to ask Ali for forgiveness. The end of them might have been in Damascus, he’d been ready to believe it right up until the very last letter and the anxious hours spent pacing along the docks. He doubts he’ll ever forget that first sight of Ali, faintly queasy from the month at sea, relief written all over his face as their eyes met.

Lawrence had enjoyed the quiet disbelief.

Neither had accounted for the legitimate appearance of the other.

In the here and now, Ali’s patting the empty spot next to him, dreadfully inviting all at once. Lawrence’s gotten the fire started and no longer dependent on the remnants of light the window’s offering, he sits down as instructed, respectfully distant. Ali’s eyes capture and reflect the flickering fire. He’s hypnotising, lit golden-brown and warm, much more real than the mirage of Lawrence’s memories.

It’s Ali who moves closer, their shoulders brushing against one another, and as he turns to face him, Lawrence understands some fundamental thing about the love -- and it is love -- spilling out of him. “Aurens, do you remember the night after the Nefud--”

Lawrence kisses him.

The angle’s all wrong and Ali’s moustache strikes Lawrence as unexpected but it’s perfect because it’s him. Lawrence does not need to wait for the catastrophe of the war to make sense again, for his shipwrecked life to be dragged to shore, he simply _needs_. Ali responds in kind then, a shuddering breath against Lawrence’s mouth before he tilts his head to the side, deepens the kiss as he goes. His hand curls around Lawrence’s hip, as pressed up as they can be on the cramped couch.

A lot of firsts present themselves tonight, this nearly among them. They’re both clumsy in their eagerness and Lawrence only wants it more, content that Ali does not mind the sudden intensity, the push-and-pull of bodies longing to be close.

He missed him.

God, how he’s missed Ali.

Finally, they part for air and smile at each other. Lawrence can practically feel the utter stupidity of his own smile, after a fashion that simply cannot be helped. Similarly, he finds himself flushed.

“Yes, I remember the night after the Nefud, Ali,” he says, still grinning. “That’s when you named me.”

It’s so _easy_ to say it, to feel the same gratitude.

Ali still looks at him like he can’t believe his eyes, always has, even at that untimely end. No, not in Damascus. The end, Lawrence has now determined, had been long before that. He’d been a fool to think he could ever be just ordinarily happy without Ali. “I would have done this then, too, if I’d known,” he adds, taking Ali’s hand in his.

“Me too.”

**Author's Note:**

> find me @ufonaut on tumblr!


End file.
